Tuesday, October 9, 2012

KTM 2012-My 2nd HM

I planned to write about this once i reached back from the KTM 2012. After my Airtel Hyd Marathon i have not been to ground or not to the gym. ( So bad) . But have enrolled for this before by Airtel Hyd Marathon. all my travel tickets has also been booked.

so no excuse can be made and i also wanted to experience a Trail run. So clubbed some of my family outing along with this. Interestingly i have enrolled for my 2 Brother inlaws also for this event.

The train journey was good and got settled in the Hotel. I really liked the scenic places of the mysore. Went to the Bib collection centre collected the same. Took the vehicle drove till my starting point and the route was little worrying becasue it was not a nice pavement but with lot of mud and stones and completely remote.

On the race day, we reached the start line on time. met few of the fellow runners. Did some stretches and prepared for the run. Again put some planning of running for 4 kms and break etc. But never it worked in my previous experience.

Remembered my previous Halfmarthon since after 12 Kms i started struggling and the finishing 500 Mts was yet another sweet memories. Recollected them and motivated myself of running my second HM and thinking of other runners.

The flag off was on right time and it started with the FM and later for the HM. I dreamt myself running a FM in future for few secs. As our event was flagged off.. it is normal for me to stand behind to avoid the crowd and any crash. The route was muddy so lot of dust started flying around till i got a place where there were few runners. Since it was 6.30 Am the sun was about the come up and there was complete green paddy fields on one side and silent and cold cauery running on my next side.
Passing each KM was very good till my 8 th km and then i started feeling the pain slowly..again motivated me that we run for this pain and continued..i started seeing my full marathoners coming back.

The best part is the motivation that you get from the fellow runners, the cheer up you do for the struggling people and help you render to the unknowns..and all the one who runs here share one passion that is running.

waited for my 10.5km U turn. and way back after each kilometer i had to take a break for few secs jog a little and then get back to my pace. I was very happy when i was able to hear the announcements from the speakers, i knew that i am very near. So now the finish mark motivates me to move faster..and tried to do a  sprint at the finish line. One improvement from my last run is that it was so hard to cross the last 500 mts..but this time it was little simple.. But i love the run when you see the finish line and you push hard to cross it at the quickest. One another milestone for me personally as i crossed the finish line and the medal was given to you.

Great feeling ..and celebrated this joy with my family.


Wednesday, September 12, 2012

Airtel Hyderabad 2012- My Journey

As i finished my first 10 K @ TCS World 10K run on May 26 in Bangalore and unofficial running of Paris 10 Km run at paris, the next thing that i looked for is when is the next run ? Where etc. It was because of the energy that i took from the crowd !!! I saw so many people of different age groups, different disabilities, and were so much energetic through out the crowd. I decided that i will do my next run.This is how i enrolled for the Airtel Hyderabad marathon 2012 edition.

As i decided that i will do my next Long distance running, but now i need to select after reviews on the web and taking stake of my physical fitness i decided to do the Half Marathon  and it is 21.1 Kms. I knew i can complete 10 Kms in 1.24 Minutes. So now strategy for the next10 Kms was  running up in my mind, But it didn't stop me in registering for the event.

In may  and June i have did my 10 KM and in August i have planned to do this. So again planning , Progressive elaboration ( A PMP technique) was used as i planned to increase my Laps in my regular running and my training was Up but to be honest i was not regular, I didn't even do any Strength training other than my regular stretches and the runnings.
As the d`day was nearing my strategy was changing ( Again my PMP Technique -change management) now i planned to complete only. And the strategy was 6 Km run 0.5 Km walk and repeat for 3 times on the entire stretch, with this in mind i boarded my train to Hyderabad along with Family ( Stake holders).
Amazing weather welcomed us  in Hyderabad, it was drizzling and chill. Checked in the hotel near the railway station, and went to the expo, collected the BIB , met my mentors other fellows, and chilled out with my family.
One of the lesson learned in my previous run is diet management on the previous day and a good sleep is required. So i went to bed early and challenged the alarm as i woke up before it and put it on rest.

August 26 ,  I was on the starting point, made a mistake of crossing the line with my timing chip.Initially it was little distracting as it would affect my timing. But again put my mind on steady state on the Scope of the run - Enjoy and Complete  not to worry about my timing. ( Avoid scope creep - PMP ). Now started enjoying the crowd. Again this is the X-factor that pulls me to the event seeing so much like minded people, getting guidance, sharing the energy , children, kids, Girls, Elders, Disabled people and lot of them .

As my event of HM was started i was in the middle and started moving into the crowd and i can see at least people in front me for Half a KM , again i put resistance to my thoughts of moving front and maintaining the pace. It was very good and my GPS on my SE mobile was on and it was guiding me.

                 My first 5 km was a cool run, and was same till next 10 Km. And i was on my same pace when i checked my GPS as it guided me for 1hr.20 Min. There were many flyovers so balancing the pace during the climbing and also during the down was interesting  and i enjoyed it fully.
This was different to my strategy but still as my progress was better i planned to move with it. and now after 10 Kms the weather was getting cool and there were all possible signs of a heavy downpour and i checked for the weather proof for my handheld and i had my BIB cover in my pockets. so i never stopped and continued i was able to realise my Pace is going down so charged me with little drinks and banana.
                And from here for me each KM was started going tough but i managed with little milestones,Like distance hoardings, flyovers,Parked vehicles,Tall Buildings etc. I switched to some fast songs on my device. It really helped me to push hard and as distance was decreasing an i was crossing 12,13,14,15 Kms and the rain was heavy, by the time was nearing the 18.5 Km the rain was decreasing and i was crossing the beautiful hitech city road and reached my last flyover.
here is when i felt the importance of the training as i was running very slow and took some help from the medicos with spray and again charged with some drinks and i crossed my 20 Km and was seeing people coming out with medals on the main road, but no sign of the stadium and now i took left and saw the stadium where the last lap and en-route there were many fellow runners who were on the way back to the parking and main road were giving us the energy .
     I noticed the countdown in metres and i entered the stadium touched the synthetic turf for the last 100 metres it was an amazing feeling that i completed and got the finished medal from a small and little kid.
  I joined with my family after few stretches and meeting with my fellow runners.As i was waiting to take a photo i had a small chat with fellow runner , after few lines of conversation he asked me are you coming to the KTM 2012? Crazy guys... and me too .. see you after my KTM 2012 run ...

Tuesday, June 26, 2012

My First 10 K run

It was in 2011 this idea to run started and i wanted to start as i had many dreams when i was young. But never worked towards that.Early in my academic side i have run some long distance like 1500Mts and once i have attempted a so called marathon at my native.
I remember my child hood days where my house was next to a big ground and we have run some morning runs like that.
It was in 2012 it became serious since i have been influenced by two people who was passion on running and it has become my Goal of 2012 to run a long distance run.
I started reading blogs,experiences etc and a fine morning i started to search for a ground and later found that there was this amazing ground pachiappas nears my home.
I started a C210, which is called as a couch to 10K program. I put my palnning and scheduling skills to target my first 10K run which was scheduled on May27th2012 at bangalore.
I was not regular on my practice, i started with 2 Km and reached 4.5 Km distance in couple of weeks.I also rejoined my gym as many of the people suggested to add stretch and core along with the running.
So i enjoyed the run in the pachiappas ground along with so many elders,young people, children doing their morning workouts in their style.
As i wanted to try a 5km run i ran from choolaimedu to geminiflyover , it was my first 5km run but at the end of the run i felt some pain in my right knee and later i consulted a doctor.It was shocking to hear from the doctor that i should not run for next 2 weeks, which means i will have no choice to try a comeback but to run directly.
It was hard but i concentrated on my core/stretch workouts.
Lot of plans were done for this event, as my family planned to miss their annual get together in their native.so with heavy heart but with determination of atleast to walk and complete the race i started to bangalore.

I changed the strategy like below which was adviced from a senior member of the www.chennairunners.com group.
1) Enjoy the run
2) Cross the finish line without injury
3) Run Walk Run

With this 3 in mind i reached bangalore, with family we all went to collect the BIB and planned the run.
On may27 morning i started @6.30 Reached the kantverra stadium in bangalore, happy to see so many people, Did a group warmup with NIKE group and started for the race.

I enjoyed all the run initially i ran for 2kms and walked for 0.5 Kms and later i could not measure but i stopped for few seconds on the course.
But for a surprise i never fet the pain in the knee and was able to complete the reace at a timing of 1H 24 Min.
I was feeling so great and joined with my family later and handedover my medal as the gift to my sons 2nd birthday.

It was a great feeling and my journey has begun here.